Do your cities really need a Metro? Centre asks states

Pointing out that Metro is a cost intensive project, the ministry has asked housing officials of all the states to relook at their Metro plans in smaller cities and check if there is real need for metro or not.Priyanka Singh | TNN | September 18, 2017, 13:00 IST

LUCKNOW: States rooting for the Metro, including Uttar Pradesh, will now have to go back to the drawing board, with the Union ministry of housing and urban affairs asking them re-analyse their project reports to find out if the cities needed a Metro or not, based on population, infrastructure and usage preference. UP is in queue for Centre's nod to Metros in six cities--Varanasi, Kanpur, Agra, Meerut, Gorakhpur and Allahabad.

Pointing out that Metro is a cost intensive project, the ministry has asked housing officials of all the states to relook at their Metro plans in smaller cities and check if there is real need for metro or not. It has also instructed states to look at alternative modes of public transport instead of Metro, depending on the local transport needs.

The announcement came on Saturday when the ministry held a meeting with the housing secretaries of states with Metro plans to discuss the new Metro rail policy of the Centre passed on August 16.

The meeting was also at The meeting was also at tended by the managing directors of all the metro corpora tions in the country, consultants and senior officials from the Centre. The meeting was held in Delhi Metro Rail Corporation office.

The new policy will re quire UP government to relook at the Metro DPRs in the six cities and might also change the plan in smaller cities like Meerut and Gorakhpur. However UP officials said that all the DPRs are well-researched and thoroughly analysed. UP's housing principal secretary, Mukul Singhal said, “Our DPRs are detailed. So revising them as per new Metro policy and getting approval from Centre will not be very difficult.“

The policy lays down guidelines for metro projects in the country and standardizes the parameters of construction, funding and operation.